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Thursday, April 22, 2010

The Helmand Valley is the site of current US military operations, but it has been on the map of US analysts for some time. Richard Scott, a retired USAID analyst, has produced an interesting website on Helmand from his archives. The site contains many primary documents of interest dating back to the 1950s. These documents can help to produce a more rich and complex understanding of the region, people, and economy of Helmand, and their location with respect to US interests.Click here to access Scott's Helmand Valley Archives homepage.

Monday, April 19, 2010

Several South Asia scholarly institutes will be holding the second dissertation into book workshop at the Madison South Asia conference in October. This is an excellent opportunity for recent PhDs. Applications to participate are due by June 15, 2010.

Monday, April 12, 2010

There is an explosion of new resources being offered online. A notable resource from Germany is SavifaDok, the Open Access document server of Savifa - the Virtual Library South Asia, is an electronic platform for publishing and archiving academic literature in the field of South Asian studies. You can find a variety full text materials historical books and journals. Noteworthy are the 19th an early 20th century journals in a few of the Indian vernaculars.SavifaDok homepage

I recently attended the annual board meeting of the American Institute of Indian Studies (AIIS) Trustees on behalf of the U of MN. I would like to highlight two things for India scholars:

Travel to India: Because of security concerns, the Government of India has been tightening up on visa requirements and violations. If you or any of your students are planning to travel to India, make sure that you do so using the correct visa (i.e. student visa, research visa, conference visa, etc.) and not on a tourist visa. Otherwise you may be sorry. Also note that if you enter India on a Tourist Visa and then leave the country, you will not be allowed back until 60 days have passed (with some exceptions). You can find out more at the Indian Consulate (http://chicago.indianconsulate.com/) and the Indian Visa Center (https://indiavisa.travisaoutsourcing.com/).

AIIS Website: The AIIS has put up a nice new website (http://www.indiastudies.org/) that has information on the Institution itself and on

Research fellowships (junior-for grad students, senior-for Ph.D. holders, and special fellowships for performing and creative artists),